Dec 21, 2009

I find something completely fascinating by this "living" portrait, shot by David Stewart. Great work david! I can imagine a lot of great frames if you were shooting a still portrait here as well. The first thing I'm drawn to, as in any great portrait (moving or still), are those amazing eyes. The power of the eyes in a portrait are central to telling the story. Furthermore, I wonder where this young lady just came from, what she is thinking, what she is watching or listening to as this video is taking place. The great portrait photographers seem to be able to establish a quick connection with the person they are photographing. It's as if for a time, the camera doesn't really exist and it's simply two people sharing a connection that makes a great picture (or in this case video). What really strikes me about this piece, is that the connection is really there. I think there's something to learn for still photographers here as we all too often have that awkward time right before we start snapping pictures where the subject isn't quite sure what to do, where to stand or how to look. Is there something to learn from thinking about a portrait in terms of motion? Maybe so...

2 comments:

interesting, haven't seen something quite like that before. I still don't think it's quite as powerful as a still portrait.

She looks very sad to me, like she's trying to hold back tears. Not so much that something bad just happened, but like she's thinking of something bittersweet, maybe a grandmother or grandfather that passed away.

So since I can maybe look that deeply into 30 seconds of video, maybe it is fairly powerful

I've seen this video recently and although from artistic standpoint I find it fascinating, I can't seem to wrap my head around its real world applications - aside from commercial work anyway. Say, for a portrait photographer, how would you sell this to a regular client and what benefit would it be for the client? Still interesting though. If I could "get it" then I'd have reason to put the video in my 5D MkII to work!